Faculty Senate meeting discusses current legislation and honors program
The Faculty Senate is comprised of faculty representing each of the programs at USD. The Senate met Wednesday night to discuss current legislation, the future of the honors program and the upcoming Frankenstein symposium.
Student Government Association issues were discussed at the start of the meeting, concerning their resolution opposing House Bill 1073.
The next discussion was on the firearms bill that would permit the carry of firearms in any area within South Dakota. Another bill discussed at the meeting included formalizing dual credit.
Scott Breuninger, director of the honors program, said the search for a new honors adviser to replace Leslie Pusey is ongoing and narrowed the selection to two people, Lynae Tucker and Dallas Doane.
Breuninger also discussed statistics of the honors program and the honors thesis program. Last year, the honors program had 61 graduates from the honors program. Currently, there are 467 students in the undergraduate honors program.
“We want incoming students to be aware of the benefits of the honors program coming in,” Breuninger said. “Any student from a second-semester freshman to a junior can apply as a thesis scholar.”
The next area of business was Emeritus faculty award, which applies to all schools and graduate and undergraduate disciplines.
The next item of discussion was positioning of tenured professors with more than 10 years of experience.
The final item on the agenda was the upcoming Frankenstein symposium event planning by LisaAnn Robertson, assistant professor of English. For the 200 year anniversary of Mary Shelley’s classic novel “Frankenstein,” the English department is hosting several free events.
“Everything is free and open to everyone, especially students,” Robertson said. “We also are having an art display at The Bean.”
Goals for the next meeting in March include elections to elect new members. Robin Ammon, division chair of kinesiology and sports management, said there are 36 positions available on the faculty senate, all from different colleges and departments.
